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Water catchment protection areas in Jokkmokk Municipality

Protection of water assets is a precondition for our municipalities being able to produce good, clean drinking water.

The basic approach to water protection is defined in the EU’s Water Framework Directive. According to Sweden’s environmental quality goals, geological formations carrying groundwater shall have long-term protection from exploitation by 2010 at the latest. One way of providing long-term protection of the water sources is to create water catchment protection areas. According to the environmental goals, surface water sources shall have defined protection areas and protection regulations by 2009 at the latest.

Many Swedish water sources still do not have water catchment protection areas, and many protection areas are old and need to be updated in order to provide the water source with complete protection. Designing protection areas with protection regulations is one of the tasks that we at ÅF perform. We also provide municipalities with assistance regarding contacts with relevant land owners and the public. In connection with drawing up a proposal for a water catchment protection area, we conduct a risk and vulnerability analysis, on the basis of which a suggested action plan is drawn up to further protect the water source.

ÅF is working to draw up proposals for water catchment protection areas with protection regulations for all municipal water sources in Jokkmokk Municipality. The water sources concerned are those in Tjalmejaur (Jokkmokk) and Porjus, as well as the groundwater sources in Kvikkjokk, Murjek, Kåbdalis and Vuollerim.

This work involves collecting background material, field inventories and measurements, calculations, demarcation of the protection areas, producing protection regulations and applying to confirm the protection areas.